


on the backs of gods

by discountghost



Category: ATEEZ (Band), K-pop
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dragon!Eden, Dragon!Seonghwa, Eden and Seonghwa are related, Gen, Genetic Engineering, Human Experimentation, Raccoon!Maddox
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 21:21:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22989724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/discountghost/pseuds/discountghost
Summary: Science, in its many achievements, takes its wonders from the backs of gods.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 24





	on the backs of gods

**Author's Note:**

> A commission for @cchaiart on twt!
> 
> I really did like the idea of this and hopefully I've done it justice!

There was chaos.

Not the kind that Eden might have thought he was used to. A frenzied run around of labcoats as they yipped and cheered like little dogs at play. He watched them quietly, tired to his bones. His tail curled around him, slow in its course to do so. He ached. His body radiated pain as he listened to the commotion outside the plexiglass window they used to observe him. Their words were clear, but he didn't want to hear them.

“Another success!” One of the doctors grinned, patted a taller man on the back. Another looked sullen, mouth working as he tried to think of something that would be anything less than productive.

He didn’t want to think of what success meant, but his mind still wandered. Would they be like him? Would the success be a creature spliced together? His spine tingled at the thought, the spires of bone plating rattling with his unease. The flurry of scientists — biologists, zoologists, chemists; there were many that boasted one doctorate or another — continued outside of his holding cell for him to watch until one approached him. Squat and round, the man approached the glass wall and knocked on it. His labored breath fogged up the glass as he pressed close.

“We’ve done it! We’ve made another of you!”

Another of him? Another dragon?

Would that mean they would stop testing him?

All he wanted was to burrow deep into the earth. It had been that way since he had woken up after the first set of transplants. The hole dug into the metal of his holding cell had been covered so many times they’d stopped trying. The metal was pulled back, a concrete crater forming. He lumbered towards it, tail bulky and off kilter. 

“He has wings!”

He. Wings. Eden thought about the wings they’d tried fitting him with. The DNA had been too different. He closed his eyes again at the memory of the grafted wings rotting from his back. He licked chapped lips before he opened his eyes to try to find the man’s tag.  _ Dr. Jo. _ The man nodded to himself before he turned and flitted away somewhere. Good riddance.

The new one was a male. A He. The last time they had tried it had been female, and it had not survived. What had they named her? The mother had said something about Lucy, but he couldn’t recall. He blinked, turned in the crater bed as there was someone at the glass again. Maddox — he thought it might have been the boy’s name; they kept him fairly isolated — blinked back at him, face softening only incrementally. It was easier to make the non-mythical ones; the rings around his eyes made them look slightly smaller. His tail puffed as the door slid open.

Eden squinted. Something smelled off. It was like baby powder and blood, and some sort of acid. He wrinkled his nose as he curled up tighter in the crater bed. Maddox froze at the movement, gaze shifting back to the doctors. Of course, they would send one of their experiments over instead of approaching themselves. One of them had a notepad. 

The boy lowered something in a bundle down to him. He watched the way the hairs on his body stood on end. He heard scribbling, faintly; someone taking notes. His attention shifted to the bundle held out to him, outstretching his hands to receive it because that was what they wanted. It hit him strong, the smell he’d caught a whiff of before.

Swaddled in blankets was a baby. A little boy. Sickness took him. Bile rose up as his stomach knotted. It grew worse as the babe parted his lips and revealed pale gums.  _ A baby. _ Awe hit him next, as the baby shifted and little wings unfurled. The skin was dark and leathery as it stretched out of the wings. He parted the blankets further as the baby stared up at him.

“S-1117.” It was said with power and authority, pride. It made his blood run cold. Not a name; a number. “That’s what our latest success is called.” He looked up in time to see the doctor that had spoken,hands clasped behind his back as he stared into the crater. “But, we figure he would bond more with you if you gave him a name?”

“Why do you want him to bond with me?” The baby cooed, squirmed in his grasp to reach for the plating at his neck.

“Because you are one and the same.”

“I can’t fly.”

“He’s your son, 3DE5.”

He blinked. He hadn’t heard his number in so long. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t you remember? When you first to us, you offered your body to science to care for your family. You signed off all the papers.” The doctor sighed, inclined his head. “You donated your sperm, even.” He gestured to the baby, as if dismissing an impossibility. “We used that to fertilize eggs of female participants until they produced the right mix we needed.

“Congratulations on your fatherhood.”

The doctor bowed, mocking. The grin on his face didn’t hide the thoughts that buzzed behind his expression. They would run test after test on the child. They would likely do the same that they’d done to him when he came of age. Eden had never been sure of what they truly wanted. Hybrids came out often. Sometimes they were mutated husks of human beings. Sometimes they presented as a perfect example of scientific prowess. He could remember one that had passed by his plexiglass strapped to a gurney and wheeled out. 

He’d watched him foam at the mouth and seize up. They’d contorted so horribly in the short seconds it had taken to wheel them past his sight, but it had been enough. Enough to make him vow the same thing he did now as he stared down at the child.

“Seonghwa.” The name came to him suddenly. “He’s Seonghwa.”

And he would make sure that Seonghwa made it out of here.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> In the case that it wasn't clear, Eden is a type of dragon that prefers burrowing rather than flying. And Maddox is a raccoon lol
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/discountghosts) / [cc](https://curiouscat.me/remeremerem)


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